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February 2017: Earth's 2nd Warmest February and 4th Warmest Month in Recorded History

By:
Jeff Masters
, 4:07 PM GMT on March 17, 2017

February 2017 was the planet's second warmest February since record keeping began in 1880, said NOAA's National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) on Friday; NASA also rated February 2017 as the second warmest February on record. The only warmer February was just last year, in 2016. Remarkably, February 2017 ranked as the fourth warmest month (expressed as the departure of temperature from average) of any month in the global historical record in the NASA database, and was the seventh warmest month in NOAA’s database—despite coming just one month after the end of a 5-month long La Niña event, which acted to cool the globe slightly. The extreme warmth of January 2017 (tenth warmest month of any month in NASA’s database) and February 2017 (fourth warmest) gives 2017 a shot at becoming Earth’s fourth consecutive warmest year on record, if a moderate or stronger El Niño event were to develop by summer, as some models are predicting.

With the exception of last month, the top five warmest months on record since 1880 (expressed as departure from the 1951 - 1980 average) in the NASA database all occurred during the strong El Niño event of 2015 - 2016, which worked to raise global air temperatures by exporting heat from the oceans:

Global ocean temperatures last month were the second warmest on record for any February, as were global land temperatures. Global satellite-measured temperatures for the lowest 8 km of the atmosphere were the fourth warmest for any February in the 39-year record, according to the University of Alabama Huntsville (UAH).

Figure 1. Departure of temperature from average for February 2017, the 2nd warmest February for the globe since record keeping began in 1880. Warmer- to much-warmer-than-average conditions were present across much of the world's land surfaces, with the most notable warm temperature departures from average (3°C–5°C above the 1981–2010 average) across much of the contiguous U.S., southeastern Canada, and across much of central and eastern Russia. Record warmth was observed over parts of the eastern contiguous United States and northern and southern Mexico. Image credit: National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI).

No billion-dollar weather disasters in February 2017; one so far in 2017No billion-dollar weather-related disasters hit the Earth last month, according to the February 2017 Catastrophe Report from insurance broker Aon Benfield. However, a destructive tornado outbreak in the southern U.S. on January 21 - 23 accumulated enough damage claims to be rated a billion dollar weather-related disaster ($1.3 billion in damage) by the end of February, the only billion-dollar weather disaster on Earth during January - February 2017. The deadliest weather-related disaster of February was the rainy season flooding in the southern African country of Zimbabwe, which killed at least 246 people and cost over $100 million.

Figure 2. The only billion dollar weather-related disaster on Earth during January - February of 2017 was a destructive tornado outbreak in the southern U.S. on January 21 - 23 that killed 21 people and did $1.3 billion in damage. At least 79 tornadoes touched down between January 21 - 23, with three of them being rated EF3. These three EF3s were responsible for 20 of the 21 deaths in the outbreak. The deadliest tornado hit Adel, Georgia, killing 11 people. In this image, we see the William Carey University's School of Business on Saturday, Jan. 21, 2017, after it was damaged by a pre-dawn EF3 tornado that moved through Hattiesburg, MS, killing 4 people. Image credit: AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis.

El Niño on its way?In its early March monthly advisory, NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center (CPC) stated that neither El Niño nor La Niña conditions were present in the Eastern Pacific, and sea surface temperatures (SSTs) in the benchmark Niño 3.4 region (in the equatorial Pacific) were near average. SSTs of 0.5°C or more above average in this region are required to be classified as weak El Niño conditions. NOAA forecasters estimate an approximately 75% chance of neutral conditions lasting through the spring, with increasing chances of an El Niño after June (50 - 55% chance.) The latest Australian Bureau of Meteorology models are more aggressive about predicting El Niño, showing El Niño conditions by April (using NOAA's SST benchmark), and the latest June-July-August run of the UKMET model predicted a moderate El Niño this summer. However, predictions made in March of El Niño are of low skill, due to the so-called “spring predictability barrier”, and we should have lower-than-usual confidence in these forecasts. The GFS model is currently not predicting any “westerly wind bursts” of surface winds in the Western Pacific that would help along the development of El Niño during the next two weeks. El Niño conditions tend to suppress Atlantic hurricane activity by bringing strong upper-level winds to the tropical Atlantic, creating high wind shear that tears storms apart.

Figure 3. Sea surface temperatures (SSTs) in the benchmark Niño 3.4 region (in the equatorial Pacific) have been a few tenths of a degree above average since mid-February; SSTs of 0.5°C or more above average in this region are required to be classified as weak El Niño conditions. Image credit: Levi Cowan, tropicaltidbits.com.

Arctic and Antarctic sea ice falls to lowest February extent on recordArctic sea ice extent during February 2017 was the lowest in the 39-year satellite record, beating the record set in February 2016, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC). The record low ice extent was due, in large part, to very warm air temperatures in the Arctic—temperatures at the 925 mb level (approximately 2,500 feet above sea level) were 2 - 5 degrees Celsius (4 - 9 degrees Fahrenheit) above average over the Arctic Ocean during February.

Sea ice has been exceptionally scant on the other end of the globe. Antarctic sea ice extent dropped below the lowest values recorded in any month in the satellite record by mid-February. They continued to sag until reaching a new record-low extent in early March.

Aging satellites for monitoring Arctic sea ice bring concernIn their March 6 monthly update, NSIDC sounded the alarm about a looming satellite gap that threatens the continuity of the 39-year satellite record of sea ice extent. After the 2016 failure of the F19 polar-orbiting satellite, there are just three satellites remaining that perform sea ice extent monitoring. These are the American F18 and F16 satellites, which are operating 2 and 8 years beyond their designed 5-year lifetimes, respectively, and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer 2 (AMSR2), which will reach its 5-year design lifetime in May 2017. It is unlikely that a new sea ice extent monitoring satellite will be launched before 2022.

One all-time national heat record and two all-time national cold records set in February 2017One territory set an all-time record for hottest temperature in recorded history in February 2017: Australia’s Cocos Islands. Two nations set all-time national cold records last month: United Arab Emirates (for an uninhabited place), and Qatar. Most nations do not maintain official databases of extreme temperature records, so the national temperature records reported here are in many cases not official. I use as my source for international weather records researcher Maximiliano Herrera, one of the world's top climatologists, who maintains a comprehensive list of extreme temperature records for every nation in the world on his website. If you reproduce this list of extremes, please cite Maximiliano Herrera as the primary source of the weather records. So far in 2017, we have two all-time national heat records and two all-time national cold records.

It is with a heavy Heart that we at Portlight are sad to report the passing of a true New Orleans Legend and Entertainer.Midge Jones passed away and we were informed just now by His good friend Claire Hartley Grogan. I met and shared a few days with Him after this entry from 2013. I will always think of the people He moved and smiled with. A life well lived and a True American Gentleman.

Quote to remember" "We say we love our kids, but do we show it? We will never deal with climate change until we learn to value our children and grandchildren at the 50-year timescale.” Climate scientist Dr. White.

And those current cooler waters in the Central Atlantic also have some correlation to the current SAL coverage across that Basin as well but things are warming up relatively quickly along that straight line from the Cape Verde Islands to the Eastern Caribbean:

Thanks for posting the SSTs Keep; here are the relevant SST's on the Equatorial Pacific Side. Too early to know, with the Spring El Nino barrier, how things will shake out by the peak of the Atlantic Hurricane season in terms of the inverse relationship between both basins but the current warming trend in the Pacific, from West to East, is consistent with a potential Modoki El Nino this year; time will tell once we get a better picture (past the Spring barrier) in May and June:

My father, my father, he liked meOh he liked me, does anyone careUnderstand what I've becomeIt wasn't my designAnd people everywhere thinkSomething better than I amBut I miss you, I miss'Cause I liked it, I liked itWhen I was out thereD'you know this, d'you knowYou did

Italy%u2019s Struggling Economy Has World%u2019s Healthiest Peopleby Wei Lu and Vincent Del GiudiceMarch 20, 2017, 12:01 AM EDTFrom When it comes to living a long life, Italy is the place to be.

The high-heeled boot surrounded by five seas is ranked the healthiest country on Earth in the Bloomberg Global Health Index of 163 countries. A baby born in Italy can expect to live to be an octogenarian. But 2,800 miles south in Sierra Leone, the average newborn will die by 52.

While Italy is among the most developed countries, growth has stagnated for decades, almost 40 percent of its youngsters are out of jobs and it%u2019s saddled with one of the world%u2019s highest debt loads relative to the size of its economy. Yet Italians are in way better shape than Americans, Canadians and Brits, who all suffer from higher blood pressure and cholesterol and poorer mental health.

"I have been authorized by the Department of Justice to confirm that the FBI, as part of our counterintelligence mission, is investigating the Russian government's efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election, Comey told the House Intelligence Committee."That includes investigating the nature of any links between individuals associated with the Trump campaign and the Russian government, and whether there was any coordination between the campaign and Russia's efforts."

Quoting 368. Grothar: I signed up on Disqus. And I find it "disqus"ting. I was so confused I found myself on an anti-science blog and it almost made sense. Hopefully it will work out, but for now, I will be taking a hiatus. Don't worry, you won't have Grothar to kick around anymore. :) Hope to see you all soon.

We went to take the kids to meet the rescue dogs this weekend down in Virginia.The dogs were so sweet and one even survived cancer.Thank you for the shout out Gro.Even though we have had disagreements in the past it is still nice and refreshing to put that aside and continue to have a wonderful relationship on the blog! Hope you come back in time for hurricane season.

Quoting 431. weathermanwannabe: In terms of Florida and Spring, and in spite of the problem with early flower and plant blooms in Jan and Feb, we drove down to South Florida and back up to North Florida over the weekend up I-75 and across North Florida on I-10. Those new leaves across North Florida in all of the oak trees just look stunning in the early am and late afternoon with the bright new leaf minty greens all along the tree lines. Cannot beat this very nice stretch of weather; it was cool in the mornings in Ft. Lauderdale and not too hot during the day..........That will all end soon as we barrel into Summer type highs over the next few weeks..............We actually have a high of 87 forecast in North Florida on Wed.

The new leaves on bradford pears and plums in my area are brown and dead and the trees themselves look like walls of gauzy brown. Never ever seen this before in the Mid Atlantic.

Quoting 182. RobertWC:Magerman told the Wall Street Journal that Mercer%u2019s political opinions %u201Cshow contempt for the social safety net that he doesn%u2019t need, but many Americans do.%u201D He also said that Mercer wants the U.S. government to be %u201Cshrunk down to the size of a pinhead.%u201D Several former colleagues of Mercer%u2019s said that his views are akin to Objectivism, the philosophy of Ayn Rand. Magerman told me, %u201CBob believes that human beings have no inherent value other than how much money they make. A cat has value, he%u2019s said, because it provides pleasure to humans. But if someone is on welfare they have negative value. If he earns a thousand times more than a schoolteacher, then he%u2019s a thousand times more valuable.%u201D Magerman added, %u201CHe thinks society is upside down%u2014that government helps the weak people get strong, and makes the strong people weak by taking their money away, through taxes.%u201D He said that this mind-set was typical of %u201Cinstant billionaires%u201D in finance, who %u201Chave no stake in society,%u201D unlike the industrialists of the past, who %u201Cbuilt real things.%u201D

You can shoot down any Christian Objectivist by pointing out that objectivisim elevates Man to the center of the universe.. the most important thing in it and this position is utterly and completely in opposition to Christian (and Jewish and Muslim) doctrine. Objectivisim is nhilistic heresy, once this is understood, unless the objectivist is prepared to completely discard his faith.

Notice how the westerly wind anomalies have been spreading west over the last 2 weeks. Unheard of to see this as you would expect this to happen from west to east not east to west. Aussies now have Nino 3.4 nearing 0.8C in April. No one expected this El-Nino to develop like this from the East not even me.

Quoting 428. StormTrackerScott: I feel bad for these people in Peru and soon to be Chile as Nino 1&2 is now heading up toward 3C. If this Nino materializes like it looks like it will this is setting up to be a very large El-Nino type signature across the Pacific.

15MAR2017 29.1 2.6 27.9 0.8 27.5 0.3 28.2 0.0

There's no cold tongue along South America this year and look at the Indian Ocean with all the cool anomalies showing up. Its just a matter of time before this oncoming El-Nino overwhelms the atmosphere across the US as its already having massive effects across South America.

This does not look like El Nino. It looks new and very different. CURRENT consequences are comparable to a mature El Nino but evolution..?? all bets are off where we go from here. Very interesting.

Quoting 182. RobertWC:Magerman told the Wall Street Journal that Mercer’s political opinions “show contempt for the social safety net that he doesn’t need, but many Americans do.” He also said that Mercer wants the U.S. government to be “shrunk down to the size of a pinhead.” Several former colleagues of Mercer’s said that his views are akin to Objectivism, the philosophy of Ayn Rand. Magerman told me, “Bob believes that human beings have no inherent value other than how much money they make. A cat has value, he’s said, because it provides pleasure to humans. But if someone is on welfare they have negative value. If he earns a thousand times more than a schoolteacher, then he’s a thousand times more valuable.” Magerman added, “He thinks society is upside down—that government helps the weak people get strong, and makes the strong people weak by taking their money away, through taxes.” He said that this mind-set was typical of “instant billionaires” in finance, who “have no stake in society,” unlike the industrialists of the past, who “built real things.”

This is very important to the weather across Florida maybe not yet but as we move later into April and into May we will likely see a moisture tap begin to move up across the Western Caribbean and across the Eastern Gulf and Florida. We need to watch this over the coming weeks in Florida as drought could turn to flood here too.

Very interested to see how early May pans out as what is going on near Peru could be what causes Tropical Mischief across the E-Pac and Western Caribbean. Convection could very likely be enhanced more than usual due to the warm E-Pac/Western Caribbean sea surface anomalies.

And finally a couple of blurbs from Science Mag on some of the impacts of proposed funding cuts in the sciences; cutting at the top, in terms of Government science agencies, also impacts University research as well:

The Trump administration may be planning to help pay for a massive 18% cut to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) by slashing payments to universities and research institutes for overhead costs, ScienceInsider has learned.

The proposed budget released by the White House yesterday, for the 2018 fiscal year that begins 1 October, contains a brief paragraph describing a $5.8 billion cut to NIH’s current $31.7 billion budget, as well as plans to reorganize the agency. The paragraph ends with this sentence: “The Budget also reduces administrative costs and rebalances Federal contributions to research funding.”“The costs are real and necessary for the conduct of research. It has to be paid for somewhere. And this historical bargain between the federal government and performers of research has been that the government pays part of the infrastructure costs,” says Tony DeCrappeo, president of the Council on Governmental Relations, a Washington, D.C.–based association of research universities and institutes that helps its members navigate federal regulations. Foundations, he adds, can get by charging a lower rate because they allow researchers to charge certain costs to their grant—such as leasing space—that can’t be charged to their NIH grant. And nonfederal grants may involve fewer regulations, lowering regulatory costs.

Though astronomers have indirectly detected thousands of exoplanets, they are just starting to get fuzzy pictures of the orbs themselves. But what can they learn from just a few pixels of light? It turns out that the Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR), a space-weather satellite with a controversial past, is answering those questions right now, says Stephen Kane, an exoplanet scientist at San Francisco State University in California. "We can get a significant advance preview of what those data will look like, because we now have a satellite that is staring directly at Earth."

Those observations are in jeopardy, however, with news today that the proposed budget of U.S. President Donald Trump seeks to kill Earth-facing instruments on DSCOVR years before the mission ends. It would be a setback for exoplanet research, Kane says. "We're enormously disappointed to hear this news."

Perched between the gravitational pull of the sun and Earth, DSCOVR, which was launched in 2015, primarily serves as a space-weather buoy, giving advance notice of inbound solar storms. But it also has two instruments that peer back at Earth and capture the entire planet with the aim of detecting long-term trends in the planet's balance of incoming and outgoing energy, along with long-term shifts in its clouds, aerosols, and ozone.

NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA The world's lakes are only about two-thirds as deep, on average, as previously thought, researchers reported here this week at a meeting of the American Physical Society. If correct, the finding could help climate scientists more accurately model global climate change, as shallower lakes generate more heat-trapping methane gas.

Satellites show roughly 100 million lakes with areas greater than a hectare dotting Earth. All together, they cover more than 30 billion hectares, roughly 2% of planet's land surface.

If Earth's lakes are, on average, significantly shallower than previously thought, that observation could have consequences for understanding climate change, Cael says. Microbes that don't require oxygen live at the bottom of lakes and produce methane. If lakes are shallower, more of that heat-trapping gas can bubble up to the surface and into the atmosphere. Current methane budgets suggest lakes produce about as much methane as the oceans and roughly half as much methane as the world's landfills, but that number may have to be revised higher, Cael says.

In terms of Florida and Spring, and in spite of the problem with early flower and plant blooms in Jan and Feb, we drove down to South Florida and back up to North Florida over the weekend up I-75 and across North Florida on I-10. Those new leaves across North Florida in all of the oak trees just look stunning in the early am and late afternoon with the bright new leaf minty greens all along the tree lines. Cannot beat this very nice stretch of weather; it was cool in the mornings in Ft. Lauderdale and not too hot during the day..........That will all end soon as we barrel into Summer type highs over the next few weeks..............We actually have a high of 87 forecast in North Florida on Wed.

What you are seeing is Westerly Wind anomalies near South America. It appears this El-Nino is going to be very different from what we have experienced over the last few decades. This El-Nino is building in from the East not the West like many have in the past. So what is happening the warm Eastern pacific anomalies are moving west across the Pacific with the Easterly Trades near the Dateline. Very fascinating to watch!

Good Morning Folks and Happy First Day of Spring. Here is the Conus forecast for today and current look: note the large nasty cell of T-storms just under Lake Michigan headed into Indiana this morning.

I feel bad for these people in Peru and soon to be Chile as Nino 1&2 is now heading up toward 3C. If this Nino materializes like it looks like it will this is setting up to be a very large El-Nino type signature across the Pacific.

15MAR2017 29.1 2.6 27.9 0.8 27.5 0.3 28.2 0.0

There's no cold tongue along South America this year and look at the Indian Ocean with all the cool anomalies showing up. Its just a matter of time before this oncoming El-Nino overwhelms the atmosphere across the US as its already having massive effects across South America.

Horrible weather related accident in Africa:Twenty teenagers die in Ghana waterfall accidentHigh school students killed by falling trees while swimming at popular tourist spot during a storm, according to officialsGuardian, Agence France-Presse in Accra, Monday 20 March 2017 09.12 GMT Twenty students in Ghana have died in a freak accident after trees fell while they were swimming at a popular tourist beauty spot, emergency officials said.Ghana national fire service spokesman Prince Billy Anaglate said the 'unusual incident' happened on Sunday afternoon, when a group of high school students were swimming at the Kintampo waterfalls, the highest waterfall in the country, in the Brong-Ahafo region.Anaglate said that a storm caused trees to topple and fall on the teenagers while they were in the water. ...

Airmass pic from yesterday afternoon when the deadly event in Ghana occurred, showing a lot of storms popping up. Looks like the wave train of Western Africa starts its first attempts to resume its activity this year.

Quoting 405. wxgeek723:Are sneaker waves a common hazard on the German coast?

Good morning, and I don't think so. Although big waves can happen in the North Sea and even in the Baltic Sea (link). Moreover in the "bathtube" of the Baltic Sea seiches do occur (link; of course, not the same as a sneaker wave). Besides that it's funny that everyone assumes that I speak of German beaches when I mentioned relaxing "at some beach", lol.

Quoting 344. Grothar: If the claims are true that one must be a member of a social website page, I will not be able to blog on here anymore. Due to my job position, I am not able to join a social network. It would be a shame if this is true. After all, if I can't post pictures of me, how will you people ever know how good I look. I have met some wonderful bloggers on here and have had more laughs. I have learned so much and have always been amazed with the knowledge and expertise expressed by so many bloggers.

I will miss the literate and informative info from Barbamz who always gives a world perspective of weather, Baltimore Brian's plethora of long forgotten tidbits of our and other civilizations. The sweetness of justmehouston, the subtle wit of pottery, the mind blowing information of Xyrus, the intersting post of Patrap, and even the ascerbic wit of pensacoladoug.

Having taught at different levels, I always get a chuckle when our younger bloggers at 13 can eloquently refute a much older blogger with a quick one liner, like TA and Astro. Washi may rant sometimes, but I still love her. I never heard a bad word from SunnyDays. The banter with GeoffWPB always puts a smile on my face. I wish I could name everyone, but that would be impossible.

And just know that two hundred yearsrom now, I'll still think of all of you fondly.

OMgosh Gro ...I think that you are the sweetie of the blog ...you will find a way to sign up without social media account ...we cant be with out you here ...it just wouldnt be the same. And yes, you look damn good

A weak tropical low lies near 12.3S 119.4E (about 700 km north northwest of Broome). It is forecast to move slowly west and then south towards the Pilbara coast. While there is some uncertainty in the forecast track, there is a chance the system reaches the central or western Pilbara coast later Thursday or Friday. There is also a chance the system moves slower and tracks to the west before reaching the coast.

The monsoon trough lies near the Cocos Islands and Christmas Island. A tropical low may form in the trough near Cocos Islands over the next couple days and then remain in the vicinity of Cocos Islands until later Saturday when it starts moving away to the southwest. The system is expected to strengthen over the next few days, with the risk of it developing into a tropical cyclone increasing towards the end of the week.